Everything works out - except in the end. In the meantime, concentrate on temptations of the flesh; on naked desire. Being properly damned brings its own joy: that's what Richard Meadows is thinking on his way to the city dump to retrieve his wife's favourite chair, which he had thrown away earlier. And that’s where he meets old flame Virginia Coates. So begins a dance of circumstance that feeds on Richard’s newfound fearlessness, and his desire to be daring. Time to lean in to the danger. How can a nice man like him get things so wrong? For some reason, the sudden closeness between Richard and Virginia doesn't yield the desired intimacy, doesn’t satisfy the passion. It is Richard’s wife, Gloria, who truly fastens on her chance for fulfilment. Quiet City is a literate, satisfying work of fiction which crosses Richard Ford with Kinky Friedman, with a noir undercurrent. Spellbinding storytelling from a novelist at the height of his powers.

In war, every action has a beginning and an end. Echo Among Warriors is a story of close combat between two opposing, equally committed adversaries. The powerful narrative immerses the reader in both sides of the battle, playing and replaying the same battle sequence from alternating viewpoints – through the eyes of the Marines and through the eyes of the North Vietnamese. The bullet fired from a Marine's M-16 at a silhouetted enemy solider crouched on the jungle path will in the next chapter tear into the flesh of that crouched NVA trooper. The story – unfolding from the initial contact to the final horrific ending – represents just one of perhaps thousands of deadly encounters that reflect the reality of battle: a mind-numbing, intensely personal experience, that forever changes the participant.

Pickett's charge has just ended, the battle of Gettysburg is over. The Confederate army is defeated and must retreat to the Potomac River forty miles away with thousands of wagons full of wounded soldiers, provisions and tens of thousands of animals. Asa Helms, a private in the Twenty-Sixth North Carolina Infantry, joined the army to oppose the Yankee's invasion of his "country. " He is torn between serving his country with honor and going home to take care of his wife who is in great need. He faces a long, seemingly impossible march with little food, little hope and the Yankees on his heels. Captain Louis Young, aide-to-camp to Confederate General James Pettigrew, is fighting to preserve a culture and a lifestyle and possible domination by the despicable Yankees. The defeat at Gettysburg, the horrendous condition of the army and the endless resources of the enemy are causing him to doubt the ability of the Confederacy to gain another major victory and thus independence. His objective is to get the rebel army across the Potomac River to preserve it to fight another day. Colonel George Gray, an Irishman, is colonel of the Sixth Michigan Cavalry. He is hell-bent on putting down the rebellion before it divides the country that has been so good to him. He is neither a soldier, nor an accomplished equestrian, and has gotten on the wrong side of his superior, General George Custer, with whom he is in constant conflict. He sees a chance to cut off the Confederate army and end the war before it reaches the Potomac River.The journey ends at the Potomac River where each soldier must face the bitter realities of this unnatural war. Asa must choose between escaping across the river or remaining with his wounded friend and facing certain captivity.

1970 - the height of the Vietnam War. A group of young Forward Air Controllers based in Thailand are assigned with supporting the Truck War and the People's War in southern Laos, where the fate of the Vietnam War, and Laos' very future, is being decided. Tasked with shutting down the Ho Chi Minh Trail - the North Vietnamese supply lines running into South Vietnam - literally stopping the constant stream of trucks in their tracks, these American airmen, call sign "Nail," fly missions 24 hours a day. Daily they run the gauntlet of intense anti-aircraft fire to bring in accurate attacks by American fighter bombers. At night, streams of red tracers scream up from the ground, seeking the metallic flesh of their fragile craft. During the day, they search the skies for the telltale black puffs of smoke that reveal the self-destructive warheads of the North Vietnamese gunners. Even when tragedy befalls the group, they perserve with their mission. But will courage and dedication be enough?

It is the height of the Troubles and Northern Ireland lies under a shadow… When Neil Fitzpatrick, a rogue Green Beret soldier, is recruited by the Irish Republican Army to help prepare a terrorist attack, Paul Stavros, his former teammate, is sent to stop him and bring him home alive. Fitzpatrick, the American son of an Irish rebel who was forced to flee his birthplace, is a Special Forces demolitions expert. Fitzpatrick knows his trade and has a personal agenda with the IRA. Alarm bells erupt when the US government learns that Fitzpatrick has gone over to the IRA. The American public can't find out that one of its elite soldiers is involved in terrorism and the US government won't rely on the British to find him. They need someone who knows Fitzpatrick and how he operates. Who better than one of his former teammates? Paul Stavros is also a Special Forces veteran. He knows little of the Irish Troubles but is about to learn. What he does know is how to fix problems and Neil has just become his biggest headache. But before Stavros can go operational, he must endure an arduous and hazardous selection process to be accepted by the joint SAS-intelligence cell that will back him up. The British aren't happy with Stavros on their turf; they'd rather do the job themselves – quickly, cleanly, and terminally. Once, Fitzpatrick and Stavros were comrades and friends. Now they are pawns on opposite sides of an ugly war where all is fair and no one is innocent. The British want to kill one, the IRA wants to kill the other. It's a race to see who will be first.

Winner of The Sunday Times CNA Literary Awards. Shortlisted for the Walter Scott Prize Torn from his parents and tribe as a boy in the 1870s, Stephen Mzamane is picked by the Anglican church to train at the Missionary College in Canterbury to be a rural preacher in Southern Africa’s Cape Colony. He is a brilliant success but troubles stalk him: his unresolved relationship with his family and people, the condescension of church leaders towards their own native pastors, and That Woman—seen once in a photograph and never forgotten. And now he has to find his mother and take her a message that will break her heart. In this raw and compelling story, Marguerite Poland employs her considerable experience as a writer and specialist in South African languages to recreate the polarised, duplicitous world of Victorian colonialism and its betrayal of the very people it claimed to be enlightening.

Eva and Maxime are two young Normans who love to live a life of adventure! One day they travel to Bayeux for a medieval fair."Have you heard of William the Conqueror? " a lady asked. "Who's that?" Maxime replied. "William was the Duke of Normandy and he even became King of England! The tale of his conquest is told on an embroidery called the Bayeux Tapestry. Let me tell you his story…"This fascinating adventure story helps young readers discover how William the Conqueror became King of England.

When a soufflé fails to rise, friends try to find out why and uncover a web of corruption that spreads throughout Bath's legal system. Set in the early 1830s, this comic gay historical novel exposes the bigotry of the times but also introduces a new literary and moral hero—Belle Nash, city councillor and bachelor. About time!

"We are all now writing stories. Sometimes in memory, sometimes in air. The wind lifts and passes us in gusts. Our stories scatter over continents, camouflaged histories we cannot share. "In this exquisite collection of short stories, readers are introduced to individuals whose existence reveals "the daily miracle" of their inner lives. With eloquent, lush language, Manini Nayar brings to the forefront immigrant women making their way in the world as mothers, wives, as outliers, and as rebels. She writes about their insistence on autonomy and on the absurdity and triumphs of their struggles. While readers will meet a wide array of characters throughout the stories, it is Nina with whom they will become most familiar as she appears throughout the collection: first, as a young wife brought to the US by her husband, Siddarth Vellodi; second, as an older sister; and third, as a (divorced) mother whose daughter tragically ran away years before. This work speaks to the obstacles with marriage, tradition, and culture - "Wives were not to be loved but endured like a menstrual headache. Her own husband had not loved her nor she him. But the Dear Departed had given her a son who was hers and hers only" - and the challenges with finding one's voice in a country whose language and communication can often be misconstrued and misunderstood. Being Here provides a compelling and profound voice to lived experiences, and exudes with remarkable observations, reflective insights, and poetic prose.

Winner of the Drue Heinz for Literature. Poised on the precipice of mystery and longing, each character in Now You Know It All is on the brink of discovery - and decision. Set in small-town North Carolina, or featuring eager Southerners venturing afar, these stories capture that crucial moment when someone’s path changes irrevocably.

When radical Iranian students seize the U.S. Embassy compound in Tehran and take over fifty diplomats hostage the U.

"In these three volumes we have one of the greatest novels not only of our generation, but of our language ..

Vernon Lee Walker, a young Englishman from industrial Wolverhampton, meets his death on a beach on Pentecost Island in the South Pacific on the eve of Christmas 1887. Why did Vernon die, in what circumstances, and who was responsible? Was he, as once branded, simply a 'bad colonist'? Or was he a Candide, an innocent abroad, mixing invisibly with the rich and famous, manipulated by a calculating brother, unable to change the world around him? An historian finds Vernon’s letters home to England, spanning a dozen years. With decreasing frequency, these follow his trajectory, first in Melbourne and Sydney, then as he yields to the spell of the Pacific. But what happens between the lines? Does he fall in love with his brother’s wife? What does a boy not tell his mother? The novelist steps in. This is a unique fusion of authentic history and informed invention - a tragic story of colonialism in Australia and the Pacific, told with compassion, humour and a deep understanding of time and place.

"In these three volumes we have one of the greatest novels not only of our generation, but of our language ..

Ultima Thule was published in 1929 and is the third novel in the 1930s trilogy, The Fortunes of Richard Mahony, by Henry Handel Richardson. Writing in Sphere in 1929, Arnold Palmer said of these works: "In these three volumes we have one of the greatest novels not only of our generation, but of our language ..

Phillip Parotti's new novel offers fast-paced action in the skies over the Sinai desert in 1916. Lieutenant Devlin Collins, an Irish-American flier in the Royal Flying Corps, expecting to fly on the Western Front, instead finds himself flying antiquated two-seater bomber and photo reconnaissance missions over the Egyptian desert against the forces of the Central Powers which are trying to capture the Suez Canal. Pitted against German machines which are up-to-date and well equipped, the men of the RFC fight at a considerable disadvantage as they go forth to meet their enemy, but committed to their cause and with aggressive spirit, no matter how great the stress of battle, they proceed and prevail, continually forcing the Turks and Germans back as the army moves slowly toward Palestine. Constantly endangered by superior German machines, facing incessant ground fire during their bombing and strafing attacks, Dev and his fellow pilot Crisp drive home their attacks with unremitting determination. In the off hours from combat, Dev discovers that he has a particular talent for planning his flight's air raids. This talent manifests itself completely in the campaign's culminating attack on the German redoubts at the battle of Magdhaba, an attack so successful that when the pilots are finally pulled back for a rest after a year of fighting, Dev is promoted and invited onto the staff at GHQ is order to apply his expertise to air planning as the army moves on Gaza with the intention of driving into Palestine.